News

State Comptroller approves $300,000 to investigate monarch decline

Texas is getting involved in the investigation into why the monarch butterfly population has declined by more than 80% over the past 20 years. Concerns that the butterfly could become a federally-listed endangered species have prompted Comptroller Glen Hegar to fund research into the abundance and distribution of milkweed, a plant that is critical for the monarch’s migration, as well as the potential costs of a listing. Critics argue that documenting the potential costs of a listing ignore the alternative- the cost of losing an iconic species like the monarch.

"All my life I have drawn sustenance from the rivers and from the hills of my native state... I want no less for all the children of America than what I was privileged to have as a boy."-Lyndon B. Johnson